1
00:00:00,120 --> 00:00:03,720
Speaker 1: You know, governments lock their darkest files away for decades.

2
00:00:03,759 --> 00:00:06,799
Sometimes we all learn a version of history in school, right,

3
00:00:06,839 --> 00:00:10,480
a neat timeline, wars, elections, big policy shifts.

4
00:00:10,599 --> 00:00:13,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, of a managed version exactly.

5
00:00:13,480 --> 00:00:17,480
Speaker 1: But that public record it's often just well, a carefully

6
00:00:17,519 --> 00:00:20,519
managed facade. Like you said, So, what happens when the

7
00:00:20,559 --> 00:00:22,640
files marked never to see the light of day, the

8
00:00:22,640 --> 00:00:26,960
what's detailing like biological testing or psychic spies, or even

9
00:00:27,000 --> 00:00:31,280
plans for false flag attacks. What happens when they finally surface.

10
00:00:31,039 --> 00:00:33,359
Speaker 2: Well, it's like an earthquake under the public narrative. It

11
00:00:33,399 --> 00:00:37,880
really creates this fracture. Yeah, and what's fascinating I think

12
00:00:37,960 --> 00:00:42,159
is how discovering these secrets forces you, the listener citizen,

13
00:00:42,479 --> 00:00:45,759
to sort of redefine your relationship with the government itself.

14
00:00:45,840 --> 00:00:47,960
Oh so, because these accounts, when they come out, they

15
00:00:48,000 --> 00:00:51,479
show the immense operational breadth of these classified projects. I

16
00:00:51,520 --> 00:00:55,520
mean everything from huge engineering schemes, high tech military plans,

17
00:00:55,640 --> 00:00:58,960
right to sometimes things that are just ethically bankrupt or

18
00:00:59,159 --> 00:01:00,640
frankly completely absurd.

19
00:01:01,000 --> 00:01:03,679
Speaker 1: Okay, so let's unpack this. Then we've pulled together a

20
00:01:03,719 --> 00:01:08,560
stack of documents, reports, first hand accounts detailing operations that

21
00:01:08,599 --> 00:01:13,400
were meticulously hidden, like really hidden, some for forty years,

22
00:01:13,400 --> 00:01:17,560
some even longer. And I covered this huge range secret

23
00:01:17,599 --> 00:01:21,920
biological experiments right in major US cities, billion dollar failures,

24
00:01:21,959 --> 00:01:24,239
trying to raise a Soviet sub.

25
00:01:24,159 --> 00:01:25,760
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, Azorian, we'll get to that.

26
00:01:25,920 --> 00:01:29,319
Speaker 1: And even the military seriously trying to turn like spoon

27
00:01:29,400 --> 00:01:31,879
bendors into actual intelligence assets.

28
00:01:31,959 --> 00:01:34,840
Speaker 2: It sounds unbelievable, but it happened. Our sources for this

29
00:01:35,000 --> 00:01:38,400
dive they span really different eras You've got World War

30
00:01:38,439 --> 00:01:42,400
two espionage and propaganda right up through the absolute peak

31
00:01:42,439 --> 00:01:46,280
of Cold War paranoia, and they reveal these consistent, sometimes

32
00:01:46,319 --> 00:01:50,079
quite unsettling patterns in how big organizations operate when they're

33
00:01:50,120 --> 00:01:52,560
outside the view of democratic.

34
00:01:52,000 --> 00:01:54,239
Speaker 1: Oversight, Which leads to the big question, I guess.

35
00:01:54,000 --> 00:01:57,280
Speaker 2: Exactly when does all that secrecy really used for legitimate

36
00:01:57,359 --> 00:02:00,319
national protection? And when is it actually a shield, a

37
00:02:00,359 --> 00:02:04,040
shield to hide maybe gross negligence or catastrophic failure, or

38
00:02:04,040 --> 00:02:07,799
even just plain moral manipulation. That tension. That's really the

39
00:02:07,840 --> 00:02:11,759
central mission for our deep dive today finding that line.

40
00:02:11,840 --> 00:02:14,319
Speaker 1: Okay, so where do we start. Let's begin with an

41
00:02:14,319 --> 00:02:19,159
operation that well, it fundamentally put military simulation way ahead

42
00:02:19,159 --> 00:02:24,039
of public health. Yeah, and it had immediate, devastating and

43
00:02:24,120 --> 00:02:28,159
incredibly long lasting consequences right here on American soil.

44
00:02:28,280 --> 00:02:31,639
Speaker 2: Yeah, this one is shilling. You're talking about Operation Sea Spray.

45
00:02:31,879 --> 00:02:33,240
Speaker 1: That's the one. Tell us about it.

46
00:02:33,280 --> 00:02:36,000
Speaker 2: Okay, So this is basically a case study in state

47
00:02:36,080 --> 00:02:40,639
sanctioned biological release onto an unsuspecting civilian population. The year

48
00:02:40,680 --> 00:02:44,599
was in nineteen fifty, late September specifically, and the setting

49
00:02:44,879 --> 00:02:48,680
the really densely populated San Francisco Bay Area. The core

50
00:02:48,800 --> 00:02:51,919
event was the US Navy intentionally sailing ships into the

51
00:02:51,960 --> 00:02:55,520
bay and using these giant sprayers to release two specific

52
00:02:55,680 --> 00:02:58,879
living types of bacteria into the air over the city.

53
00:02:59,159 --> 00:03:02,199
Speaker 1: Sure, spray bacteria over San Francisco. What were they thinking?

54
00:03:02,280 --> 00:03:03,159
What was the justification?

55
00:03:03,360 --> 00:03:05,919
Speaker 2: Well, the justification they kept secret until nineteen seventy seven

56
00:03:06,000 --> 00:03:08,800
was simulation. They claimed they needed to simulate what would

57
00:03:08,800 --> 00:03:11,800
happen if, say, an enemy deployed a bioweapon attack on

58
00:03:11,840 --> 00:03:16,599
a major city. Okay, they wanted to track aerosol dispersion, basically,

59
00:03:16,680 --> 00:03:19,319
map how far a weapon like that would travel across

60
00:03:19,360 --> 00:03:22,120
a city of millions of people. So they needed something.

61
00:03:21,800 --> 00:03:25,599
Speaker 1: To track, and they chose bacteria, which ones, two specific

62
00:03:25,599 --> 00:03:31,080
ones Seratia Marceessens and Basillis globegi. Now the choice here

63
00:03:31,120 --> 00:03:34,599
is actually pretty crucial and often gets overlooked. Wow, Besill's Globegi,

64
00:03:34,759 --> 00:03:37,919
which we now know is Basilla's subtilis, was chosen mainly

65
00:03:37,960 --> 00:03:41,039
because it was easy to detect. They had surveillance monitors

66
00:03:41,080 --> 00:03:42,080
set up across the city.

67
00:03:42,120 --> 00:03:45,240
Speaker 2: Okay, makes sense for tracking. What about the other one, Siatia.

68
00:03:44,919 --> 00:03:49,159
Speaker 1: Ah Siatiu marceessens. That was chosen because at the time,

69
00:03:49,240 --> 00:03:52,680
the prevailing scientific view was that it was a non pathogen.

70
00:03:53,159 --> 00:03:55,680
They thought it wouldn't make anyone seriously ill, they thought

71
00:03:55,919 --> 00:03:58,960
they thought plus and this was key for tracking. It

72
00:03:59,039 --> 00:04:03,680
produces this really distinctive, kind of bizarre red pigment made

73
00:04:03,759 --> 00:04:07,599
it incredibly easy to spot in samples. So the Navy

74
00:04:07,680 --> 00:04:11,360
picked organisms they believed were low risk, easily traceable, perfect

75
00:04:11,400 --> 00:04:12,000
data points.

76
00:04:12,120 --> 00:04:14,599
Speaker 2: Except the results were not low risk, were they not

77
00:04:14,719 --> 00:04:18,959
at all? Within weeks the effects became tragically apparent. We

78
00:04:19,000 --> 00:04:22,240
know that eleven people suddenly showed up at Stanford Hospital,

79
00:04:22,720 --> 00:04:25,040
all with severe urinary tract infection.

80
00:04:25,240 --> 00:04:28,079
Speaker 1: Eleven people just like that, just like that, And.

81
00:04:28,079 --> 00:04:31,319
Speaker 2: When the doctors tested their urine, they found that signature

82
00:04:31,639 --> 00:04:36,680
bizarre red colored bacteria. They identified it as seratium or sessence.

83
00:04:37,040 --> 00:04:39,439
Speaker 1: Wow, and was that common? Did they know where it

84
00:04:39,480 --> 00:04:40,040
came from?

85
00:04:40,120 --> 00:04:44,000
Speaker 2: Absolutely not. Outbreaks of this specific bacteria were so rare

86
00:04:44,079 --> 00:04:49,040
back then. This cluster of cases was genuinely mysterious, medically shocking,

87
00:04:49,079 --> 00:04:52,680
actually severe enough that the doctors published the findings in

88
00:04:52,680 --> 00:04:56,480
a medical journal at the time. Their first suspicion that

89
00:04:56,519 --> 00:04:59,600
it originated inside the hospital, you know, like a hospital

90
00:04:59,639 --> 00:05:03,920
born in especially comment after surgery. They did extensive internal

91
00:05:03,920 --> 00:05:06,120
investigations trying to find the source, but.

92
00:05:06,120 --> 00:05:08,959
Speaker 1: The real source was outside, being sprayed from Navy ships,

93
00:05:09,079 --> 00:05:11,000
hidden classified files exactly.

94
00:05:11,519 --> 00:05:14,199
Speaker 2: And the human cost really comes into focus with the

95
00:05:14,240 --> 00:05:17,680
tragic case of Edward Nevin. He was recovering from prostate

96
00:05:17,720 --> 00:05:21,399
surgery at the time he contracted the SERRATIONI infection and

97
00:05:21,439 --> 00:05:23,639
he didn't survive. It claimed his life.

98
00:05:23,920 --> 00:05:25,680
Speaker 1: So he died because of the secret test.

99
00:05:25,879 --> 00:05:29,480
Speaker 2: Well, that's the devastating implication, while the other ten patients

100
00:05:29,519 --> 00:05:33,720
in that specific cluster eventually recovered. The strong possibility that

101
00:05:33,800 --> 00:05:36,759
his death was a direct consequence of a secret government

102
00:05:36,800 --> 00:05:40,079
experiment on his own city. It's just a gut punch,

103
00:05:40,800 --> 00:05:43,199
especially for his family and for the public once it

104
00:05:43,240 --> 00:05:43,759
came out.

105
00:05:43,839 --> 00:05:47,199
Speaker 1: And that's just the eleven confirmed cases at Stanford. What

106
00:05:47,279 --> 00:05:48,519
about wider effects.

107
00:05:48,759 --> 00:05:52,079
Speaker 2: That's the other deeply tripling part. Our sources mentioned reports

108
00:05:52,079 --> 00:05:55,160
that pneumonia cases spiked significantly in the Bay.

109
00:05:55,000 --> 00:05:57,279
Speaker 1: Area that year really linked to the bacteria.

110
00:05:57,399 --> 00:06:00,759
Speaker 2: It's impossible to prove definitively because nobody knew the test

111
00:06:00,879 --> 00:06:03,480
was happening. There was no informed consent, so there was

112
00:06:03,519 --> 00:06:07,000
no mechanism to track broader health issues. So the possibility

113
00:06:07,040 --> 00:06:11,000
that sea spray caused a wider health crisis, while never proven,

114
00:06:11,399 --> 00:06:14,439
has certainly never been ruled out either. It casts this

115
00:06:14,639 --> 00:06:17,480
really dark shadow over that year's public health.

116
00:06:17,319 --> 00:06:20,240
Speaker 1: Records, and the secrecy lasted for decades.

117
00:06:20,160 --> 00:06:24,079
Speaker 2: Until nineteen seventy seven. That's when investigations finally brought the

118
00:06:24,079 --> 00:06:28,360
truth to light. But here's the thing. The bacteria didn't

119
00:06:28,399 --> 00:06:30,279
just disappear when the tests stopped.

120
00:06:30,519 --> 00:06:30,959
Speaker 1: What do you mean?

121
00:06:31,160 --> 00:06:33,800
Speaker 2: The sources are quite clear on this. The release actually

122
00:06:33,879 --> 00:06:37,839
altered the local microbiome in the Bay Area. Ciatia is

123
00:06:37,879 --> 00:06:40,439
pretty hardy. It lingered in the soil, the air, the

124
00:06:40,480 --> 00:06:42,000
water around San Francisco.

125
00:06:42,279 --> 00:06:46,000
Speaker 1: It a depth a stuck around for years decades.

126
00:06:45,680 --> 00:06:50,759
Speaker 2: And that environmental contamination meant that subsequent, completely unrelated outbreaks

127
00:06:50,759 --> 00:06:53,360
were possible long after the Navy sailed away.

128
00:06:53,600 --> 00:06:57,120
Speaker 1: Wow, were there legal consequences? Did Devon's family do anything

129
00:06:57,360 --> 00:06:57,879
they did?

130
00:06:58,279 --> 00:07:02,079
Speaker 2: In nineteen eighty one, Edward's family sued the government for negligence,

131
00:07:02,560 --> 00:07:05,800
now proving causation years after the fact against a massive

132
00:07:05,920 --> 00:07:09,360
entity like the government. It's incredibly difficult, I can imagine,

133
00:07:09,399 --> 00:07:13,480
but the lawsuit itself underscored the need for accountability for answers.

134
00:07:13,680 --> 00:07:15,600
Speaker 1: Did the contamination cost problems later on?

135
00:07:15,959 --> 00:07:18,720
Speaker 2: It absolutely did. Look at the later outbreaks. In two

136
00:07:18,759 --> 00:07:20,920
thousand and one, that's over fifty years later, there was

137
00:07:20,920 --> 00:07:23,839
a meningitis outbreak in Walnut Creek, which is about forty

138
00:07:23,920 --> 00:07:28,759
kilometers east of SSH. The source a local pharmacies supply

139
00:07:28,920 --> 00:07:32,839
of spinal injections. They'd been contaminated with the exact same

140
00:07:32,879 --> 00:07:36,680
Ceratia bacteria the way. Yeah, three people died in that outbreak,

141
00:07:36,720 --> 00:07:40,199
ten were hospitalized. It links right back to an environmental

142
00:07:40,199 --> 00:07:41,879
presence that simply shouldn't have been there.

143
00:07:41,959 --> 00:07:44,079
Speaker 1: That's unbelievable any other instances.

144
00:07:44,360 --> 00:07:46,879
Speaker 2: Even more recently, in two thousand and four, a biotech

145
00:07:46,959 --> 00:07:50,439
firm based in Emeryville chiron Core had to throw out

146
00:07:50,439 --> 00:07:54,720
an entire batch of flu vaccines. Why contamination trace back

147
00:07:54,720 --> 00:07:57,800
to the facility's environment again likely ciatia.

148
00:07:58,199 --> 00:08:02,759
Speaker 1: So a secret test in nineteen fifty leads to deaths, lawsuits,

149
00:08:03,079 --> 00:08:08,480
lingering contamination, deadly outbreaks decades later, even impacting vaccine production.

150
00:08:08,879 --> 00:08:11,959
Speaker 2: It's an incredible tragic chain of consequences when a government

151
00:08:12,000 --> 00:08:16,759
prioritizes military simulation over citizen safety, releases biological agents, even

152
00:08:16,800 --> 00:08:20,120
ones presumed benign, and then hides it. The difficulty improving

153
00:08:20,160 --> 00:08:22,480
cause and effect later just highlights the impunity.

154
00:08:22,560 --> 00:08:24,879
Speaker 1: It really makes you wonder, doesn't it. How many other

155
00:08:24,959 --> 00:08:28,519
weird health clusters or environmental shifts in cities might trace

156
00:08:28,560 --> 00:08:31,439
back to some long forgotten, undisclosed test activity.

157
00:08:31,560 --> 00:08:35,679
Speaker 2: Precisely, the failure of oversight means the real cost of

158
00:08:35,679 --> 00:08:41,320
that secrecy is paid by the unsuspecting public, potentially for generations. Yeah, okay,

159
00:08:41,360 --> 00:08:45,000
So from physical contamination of the environment, let's shift gears. Now,

160
00:08:45,080 --> 00:08:49,919
let's talk about psychological contamination, the systemic effort to manipulate

161
00:08:49,919 --> 00:08:52,960
information to disrupt enemy structures from within.

162
00:08:53,080 --> 00:08:54,600
Speaker 1: All right, where does that take us?

163
00:08:55,000 --> 00:08:58,159
Speaker 2: This brings us squarely to Operation Mockingbird.

164
00:08:59,000 --> 00:09:01,799
Speaker 1: Mockingbird. This is the one that really shook people's faith

165
00:09:01,840 --> 00:09:02,519
in the media.

166
00:09:02,360 --> 00:09:05,799
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, absolutely, And the revelation didn't come from some

167
00:09:05,960 --> 00:09:12,039
classified leak initially, but from incredible investigative journalism. Carl Bernstein, Yes,

168
00:09:12,080 --> 00:09:15,440
the Watergate. Bernstein dropped this bombshell in a nineteen seventy

169
00:09:15,480 --> 00:09:16,919
seven Rolling Stone article.

170
00:09:17,039 --> 00:09:17,960
Speaker 1: And what did he reveal?

171
00:09:18,159 --> 00:09:21,200
Speaker 2: He revealed that hundreds of American journalists were secretly acting

172
00:09:21,240 --> 00:09:24,519
as CIA assets part of this program Operation Mockingbird.

173
00:09:24,720 --> 00:09:26,960
Speaker 1: Hundreds were they spies? What were they doing?

174
00:09:27,360 --> 00:09:29,840
Speaker 2: It's important to understand how this evolved. It actually started

175
00:09:29,879 --> 00:09:32,879
way back during World War Two with the OSS, which

176
00:09:32,919 --> 00:09:36,879
was the precursor to the CIA. Journalists, by their very nature,

177
00:09:37,039 --> 00:09:40,840
travel widely, they ask probing questions. They were seen as

178
00:09:40,919 --> 00:09:44,639
natural allies for gathering intelligence. By the time the Cold

179
00:09:44,679 --> 00:09:48,279
War was really raging, these informal ties had solidified into

180
00:09:48,480 --> 00:09:51,279
actual operational relationships.

181
00:09:50,559 --> 00:09:52,799
Speaker 1: So the CIA was actively using.

182
00:09:52,559 --> 00:09:58,399
Speaker 2: Reporters systematically using accredited American reporters as intelligence assets abroad.

183
00:09:58,879 --> 00:10:02,639
These journalists would travel across Western Europe, later into South America,

184
00:10:03,039 --> 00:10:07,799
gathering vital intel on foreign political movements, leaders, local sentiment,

185
00:10:08,279 --> 00:10:11,279
all under the perfect cover of just doing their job

186
00:10:11,440 --> 00:10:12,440
filing stories.

187
00:10:12,879 --> 00:10:14,679
Speaker 1: Was there a trade off? What did the journalists get

188
00:10:14,679 --> 00:10:15,159
out of it?

189
00:10:15,159 --> 00:10:18,360
Speaker 2: It was a highly classified quid pro quo. The reporters

190
00:10:18,360 --> 00:10:20,960
gathered information the agency wanted, and in return they got

191
00:10:21,000 --> 00:10:25,080
exclusive stories scoops about CIA operations. Okay, but these were

192
00:10:25,120 --> 00:10:27,840
stories the agency wanted out there, stories that serve perceived

193
00:10:27,840 --> 00:10:31,159
American interests. Usually framed US pushing back against the threat

194
00:10:31,159 --> 00:10:33,279
of communism. It was a way for the government to

195
00:10:33,320 --> 00:10:35,600
try and manage the global information environment.

196
00:10:35,679 --> 00:10:38,120
Speaker 1: How many journalists were involved, you said, hundreds? But were

197
00:10:38,200 --> 00:10:39,519
they all like paid agents?

198
00:10:39,799 --> 00:10:42,440
Speaker 2: The sources suggest that at the peak, maybe around one

199
00:10:42,559 --> 00:10:46,440
hundred journalists were actually on the CIS payroll, but many

200
00:10:46,440 --> 00:10:50,720
more were likely involved in less formal arrangements. This went on.

201
00:10:50,799 --> 00:10:53,559
Speaker 1: For decades until when what stopped it?

202
00:10:53,759 --> 00:10:57,279
Speaker 2: Intense pressure and public outcry in the mid nineteen seventies,

203
00:10:57,279 --> 00:11:01,879
particularly after Watergate and other revelations about intelligence abuses, it

204
00:11:02,039 --> 00:11:05,440
forced the issue. The agency publicly announced in nineteen seventy

205
00:11:05,480 --> 00:11:08,399
six that they were cutting those ties. They promised no

206
00:11:08,480 --> 00:11:12,000
more paid or contractual relationship with the credited US reporters.

207
00:11:12,159 --> 00:11:14,879
Speaker 1: But the damage was done, wasn't it, especially to trust?

208
00:11:14,960 --> 00:11:18,600
Speaker 2: Oh? Absolutely, And here's a crucial point. Bernstein's reporting specifically

209
00:11:18,679 --> 00:11:22,919
focused on journalists working abroad gathering foreign intelligence.

210
00:11:22,440 --> 00:11:23,960
Speaker 1: Right, non domestic propaganda.

211
00:11:24,120 --> 00:11:27,080
Speaker 2: Correct, but the long term damage was definitely felt domestically.

212
00:11:27,440 --> 00:11:31,720
The revelation itself fueled this intense, lasting suspicion. It created

213
00:11:31,720 --> 00:11:34,240
a permanent crack in the foundation of trust between the

214
00:11:34,240 --> 00:11:37,200
press and the public, and it directly feeds into modern

215
00:11:37,200 --> 00:11:41,240
conspiracy theories. You still hear today about agency brigged reporters

216
00:11:41,279 --> 00:11:44,399
pushing propaganda within the US media itself.

217
00:11:44,039 --> 00:11:46,519
Speaker 1: Even though the original focus was overseas.

218
00:11:46,279 --> 00:11:49,519
Speaker 2: Even though the documented program was focused overseas, it proved

219
00:11:49,519 --> 00:11:53,039
the government had the capacity and importantly, the institutional willingness

220
00:11:53,080 --> 00:11:55,919
to co opt the narrative structure itself. That's a hard

221
00:11:55,919 --> 00:11:56,679
bell to unring.

222
00:11:57,120 --> 00:11:59,279
Speaker 1: Okay, So if the government was trying to co opt

223
00:11:59,639 --> 00:12:02,759
the big narrative, how did they try to get everyday

224
00:12:02,799 --> 00:12:06,120
people involved in disruption on a smaller scale.

225
00:12:06,279 --> 00:12:09,159
Speaker 2: Ah. That brings us to one of the most well,

226
00:12:09,240 --> 00:12:15,720
delightfully unsettling documents ever declassified, the OSS Simple Sabotage Field

227
00:12:15,720 --> 00:12:17,240
Manual from nineteen forty four.

228
00:12:17,360 --> 00:12:22,360
Speaker 1: Simple Sabotage sounds intriguing OSS again, so pre CIA.

229
00:12:22,240 --> 00:12:25,879
Speaker 2: Right Office of Strategic Services. During World War II, they

230
00:12:25,879 --> 00:12:29,159
developed this comprehensive guide, but not for spis or commandos.

231
00:12:29,240 --> 00:12:32,720
It was for the average person living in Nazi occupied Europe.

232
00:12:32,399 --> 00:12:34,159
Speaker 1: For ordinary citizens. What was the goal.

233
00:12:34,360 --> 00:12:37,200
Speaker 2: The goal was to transform ordinary citizens into what the

234
00:12:37,240 --> 00:12:39,799
manual literally called citizen saboteurs.

235
00:12:39,840 --> 00:12:42,200
Speaker 1: Citizen saboteurs how like blowing things up?

236
00:12:42,279 --> 00:12:44,840
Speaker 2: Mostly No, that's the brilliance of it. It focused on

237
00:12:44,919 --> 00:12:48,759
non violent, untraceable, often non provable acts of rebellion, things

238
00:12:48,759 --> 00:12:51,720
that could easily be dismissed as just accidents or incompetence

239
00:12:51,799 --> 00:12:53,480
or simple bureaucratic oversight.

240
00:12:53,919 --> 00:12:57,360
Speaker 1: So weaponizing inefficiency.

241
00:12:56,720 --> 00:13:02,080
Speaker 2: Exactly, weaponizing banality and bureaucracy against an occupying force. It's genius.

242
00:13:02,120 --> 00:13:04,240
Speaker 1: Really, Give me some examples. What kind of things did

243
00:13:04,279 --> 00:13:04,759
it suggest?

244
00:13:04,840 --> 00:13:08,519
Speaker 2: Okay, consider administrative tactics. If you worked in an office

245
00:13:08,559 --> 00:13:12,240
under occupation, you were advised to be excessively meticulous about

246
00:13:12,279 --> 00:13:17,480
tiny details, find ways to slightly mishear direct instructions, Insist

247
00:13:17,519 --> 00:13:22,399
on forming unnecessary committees for everything, complicate processes by requiring

248
00:13:22,480 --> 00:13:24,559
multiple layers of pointless review uhha.

249
00:13:24,720 --> 00:13:26,759
Speaker 1: Basically make bureaucracy unbearable.

250
00:13:26,840 --> 00:13:30,000
Speaker 2: Precisely weaponize and competence and paperwork.

251
00:13:30,159 --> 00:13:31,559
Speaker 1: What about more physical stuff?

252
00:13:32,039 --> 00:13:36,240
Speaker 2: Factory workers just as insidious, but subtle. Dull your tools,

253
00:13:36,279 --> 00:13:39,759
slightly dirty them, increase the chance of vehicles breaking down later.

254
00:13:40,080 --> 00:13:43,480
If you were, say, sweeping a barrack's floor, the manual

255
00:13:43,519 --> 00:13:46,559
suggested sweeping dirt under the rugs to accelerate wear and tear,

256
00:13:46,840 --> 00:13:48,720
or maybe accidentally block a fire hydrant.

257
00:13:48,799 --> 00:13:50,480
Speaker 1: Little things that add up exactly.

258
00:13:50,840 --> 00:13:54,919
Speaker 2: The goal was friction, decrease efficiency, subtly chip away at

259
00:13:55,039 --> 00:13:57,600
enemy morale and infrastructure day by day.

260
00:13:57,879 --> 00:14:00,000
Speaker 1: Were there tips for just everyday interactions?

261
00:14:00,360 --> 00:14:05,120
Speaker 2: Oh? Yeah, Nuisance acts encourage ordinary citizens to give Nazi

262
00:14:05,120 --> 00:14:09,679
soldiers the wrong directions, make pointless phone calls to their offices. Sorry,

263
00:14:09,720 --> 00:14:13,840
wrong number, then hang up. Imagine thousands of people doing

264
00:14:13,879 --> 00:14:17,879
these tiny, frustrating things every single day, across a whole continent.

265
00:14:18,039 --> 00:14:20,120
Speaker 1: The cumulative effect must have been madening.

266
00:14:20,120 --> 00:14:23,960
Speaker 2: That's the idea, soul crushing inconvenience as a form of resistance.

267
00:14:24,039 --> 00:14:25,600
Speaker 1: Is this manual still classified?

268
00:14:25,720 --> 00:14:28,559
Speaker 2: Nope, that's what's wild. The CIAD classified it in two

269
00:14:28,559 --> 00:14:30,720
thousand and Eight's publicly available on their website. Now you

270
00:14:30,720 --> 00:14:31,320
can go read it.

271
00:14:31,440 --> 00:14:34,360
Speaker 1: Wow, a historical blueprint for everyday.

272
00:14:34,000 --> 00:14:36,559
Speaker 2: Resistance, and it really highlights that the greatest tools for

273
00:14:36,600 --> 00:14:41,799
subversion are often patients process and just pervasive, annoying inconvenience.

274
00:14:42,000 --> 00:14:46,519
Speaker 1: So you see this progression, sophisticated narrative control with Mockingbird,

275
00:14:46,840 --> 00:14:50,519
and this effective grassroots disruption with the Sabotage Manual, A

276
00:14:50,559 --> 00:14:53,840
real shift towards psychological and non lethal stuff.

277
00:14:54,000 --> 00:14:57,720
Speaker 2: Very effective shift in many ways, but sometimes sometimes the

278
00:14:57,720 --> 00:15:00,360
pursuit of non lethal means led to things that were

279
00:15:00,399 --> 00:15:05,039
not just ineffective, but completely and utterly absurd.

280
00:15:05,120 --> 00:15:06,840
Speaker 1: Okay, I have a feeling I know where this is going.

281
00:15:06,879 --> 00:15:10,000
Are we talking about the gay bomb?

282
00:15:10,480 --> 00:15:14,080
Speaker 2: We are, indeed talking about the infamous gay bomb?

283
00:15:14,240 --> 00:15:17,600
Speaker 1: Was that? I mean, was that real? A real proposal? Oh?

284
00:15:17,679 --> 00:15:21,120
Speaker 2: It was real. The term is informal, obviously, but it's

285
00:15:21,159 --> 00:15:24,480
an accurate nickname for a US Air Force research proposal

286
00:15:24,720 --> 00:15:28,480
filed in nineteen ninety four. The planners, based in Ohio

287
00:15:28,639 --> 00:15:32,759
were genuinely serious about creating a chemical weapon, non lethal

288
00:15:32,919 --> 00:15:35,120
but debilitating through distraction.

289
00:15:35,399 --> 00:15:35,879
Speaker 1: Distraction.

290
00:15:36,080 --> 00:15:39,039
Speaker 2: How the concept laid out in the proposal was to

291
00:15:39,120 --> 00:15:44,200
engineer a chemical aphrodigiac, something that, when sprayed over enemy positions,

292
00:15:44,200 --> 00:15:46,720
would make the soldiers and I quote so gay and

293
00:15:46,799 --> 00:15:49,399
horny that they'd be too distracted to be combat effective.

294
00:15:49,559 --> 00:15:51,279
Speaker 1: You're kidding. They actually wrote that down.

295
00:15:51,360 --> 00:15:53,080
Speaker 2: They actually read that down. It sounds like a terrible

296
00:15:53,080 --> 00:15:55,919
B movie plot, But the proposal itself was detailed. It

297
00:15:55,960 --> 00:15:57,440
went through several stages of planning.

298
00:15:57,480 --> 00:16:00,000
Speaker 1: Did they estimate a cost? This wasn't just some joke, right,

299
00:16:00,000 --> 00:16:00,720
I not a joke to them.

300
00:16:00,720 --> 00:16:04,200
Speaker 2: Apparently they estimated the research and development costs at seven

301
00:16:04,320 --> 00:16:05,200
point five.

302
00:16:05,000 --> 00:16:06,919
Speaker 1: Million dollars seven and a half million.

303
00:16:07,120 --> 00:16:09,879
Speaker 2: That figure alone tells you something. This wasn't just a

304
00:16:09,960 --> 00:16:14,320
dudol on napkin. It involved institutional resources, multiple levels of

305
00:16:14,360 --> 00:16:15,840
review before it even got leaked.

306
00:16:16,279 --> 00:16:19,080
Speaker 1: So did they did you build it? Please tell me

307
00:16:19,120 --> 00:16:19,799
they didn't build it?

308
00:16:20,039 --> 00:16:23,600
Speaker 2: Thankfully, No, the project was never actually funded, but the

309
00:16:23,679 --> 00:16:25,440
proposal was leaked to the public.

310
00:16:25,559 --> 00:16:26,679
Speaker 1: Well, I bet that one Overwhell.

311
00:16:26,759 --> 00:16:31,480
Speaker 2: The ridicule was immediate, widespread, and entirely deserved. It serves

312
00:16:31,519 --> 00:16:35,600
as this bizarre, frankly hilarious, but also embarrassing endpoint to

313
00:16:35,639 --> 00:16:38,879
that whole psychological warfare journey. It just shows that even

314
00:16:38,919 --> 00:16:41,799
when you're focused on non lethal options, you can still

315
00:16:41,840 --> 00:16:47,519
waste massive resources on wildly improbable, frankly ridiculous concepts. From

316
00:16:47,559 --> 00:16:52,879
the sophisticated OSS tactics to hormonal chaos bombs. Quite a trajectory,

317
00:16:54,120 --> 00:16:58,240
all right. So, shifting from the psychological and the occasionally absurd,

318
00:16:58,320 --> 00:17:00,919
let's move into some major Cold War ambits, projects that

319
00:17:01,000 --> 00:17:04,799
required massive, complex engineering, staggering amounts of money, and, in

320
00:17:04,839 --> 00:17:08,519
one very notable case, a complete suspension of rational belief.

321
00:17:08,640 --> 00:17:10,839
Speaker 1: Okay, sounds like big stuff. Where do we start.

322
00:17:11,119 --> 00:17:14,319
Speaker 2: Let's start with a feat of engineering, an espionage that

323
00:17:14,359 --> 00:17:18,880
honestly reads like a spy thriller, Project Azorian, the Great

324
00:17:18,960 --> 00:17:20,680
Soviet Submarine Heists.

325
00:17:20,519 --> 00:17:22,880
Speaker 1: The submarine heist. Right when did this happen?

326
00:17:23,039 --> 00:17:26,640
Speaker 2: The story begins back in February nineteen sixty eight. A

327
00:17:26,759 --> 00:17:31,039
Soviet ballistic missile submarine, the K one twenty nine, went

328
00:17:31,240 --> 00:17:35,039
radio silent deep in the Pacific Ocean, just vanished, vanished,

329
00:17:35,319 --> 00:17:39,240
Declared missing in March. The Soviets spent months searching huge

330
00:17:39,359 --> 00:17:41,920
naval operations, but they couldn't find it. They had no

331
00:17:41,960 --> 00:17:42,839
idea where it went.

332
00:17:42,720 --> 00:17:44,519
Speaker 1: Down, but the US knew ah well.

333
00:17:44,559 --> 00:17:48,000
Speaker 2: Meanwhile, US Navy analysts are listening. They were using their

334
00:17:48,160 --> 00:17:53,119
highly sensitive, highly classified SOSIS hydrophone array sosis.

335
00:17:53,319 --> 00:17:53,680
Speaker 1: What's that?

336
00:17:54,039 --> 00:17:56,960
Speaker 2: Think of it as a massive network of underwater microphones

337
00:17:57,000 --> 00:18:00,319
basically placed strategically on the ocean floor, primarily desire to

338
00:18:00,359 --> 00:18:03,759
detect and track Soviet subs. Okay, so the US quickly

339
00:18:03,799 --> 00:18:07,039
noticed this strange Soviet search patterns. The analysts went back

340
00:18:07,039 --> 00:18:09,200
through their acoustic data recordings from around the time the

341
00:18:09,240 --> 00:18:11,559
K one twenty nine disappeared, and they found something that

342
00:18:11,640 --> 00:18:13,119
Soviets had missed entirely.

343
00:18:13,240 --> 00:18:13,720
Speaker 1: Would they hear?

344
00:18:13,880 --> 00:18:17,359
Speaker 2: They picked up a distinct, very low frequency acoustic signature.

345
00:18:17,720 --> 00:18:20,880
It suggested the K one twenty nine hadn't just sunk quietly,

346
00:18:21,440 --> 00:18:25,279
It had violently imploded, probably due to some catastrophic malfunction.

347
00:18:25,400 --> 00:18:29,440
Speaker 1: Imploded. Wow, did they know where the acoustic.

348
00:18:29,000 --> 00:18:32,559
Speaker 2: Data was precise enough using triangulation from multiple sensors that

349
00:18:32,599 --> 00:18:35,880
the Navy pin planted the REX location miles deep on

350
00:18:35,920 --> 00:18:36,680
the ocean.

351
00:18:36,400 --> 00:18:39,640
Speaker 1: Floor, So they knew exactly where this advanced Soviet sub

352
00:18:39,720 --> 00:18:40,640
was lying they did.

353
00:18:41,119 --> 00:18:44,079
Speaker 2: They even sent deep sea remote cameras down to scout

354
00:18:44,119 --> 00:18:47,359
it out, confirming it was largely intact and likely contained

355
00:18:47,440 --> 00:18:51,480
highly sensitive tech nuclear missiles, codebooks, that sort of thing.

356
00:18:51,720 --> 00:18:54,519
Speaker 1: Okay, so finding it is one thing. Getting it back

357
00:18:55,000 --> 00:18:56,319
that sounds impossible.

358
00:18:56,440 --> 00:18:59,960
Speaker 2: That discovery led to an incredibly audacious, top secret proposal.

359
00:19:00,519 --> 00:19:03,200
It came from Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird and National

360
00:19:03,200 --> 00:19:07,640
Security Advisor Henry Kissinger. Their idea, let's raise the wreck,

361
00:19:07,720 --> 00:19:10,319
Let's get our hands on that Soviet technology.

362
00:19:09,839 --> 00:19:11,599
Speaker 1: Raise a submarine from miles deep.

363
00:19:11,640 --> 00:19:16,079
Speaker 2: Seriously, seriously. President Nixon approved the unbelievably risky plan, and

364
00:19:16,240 --> 00:19:19,119
he put the CIA in charge of the whole extraction operation.

365
00:19:19,480 --> 00:19:20,920
Project Azorian was born.

366
00:19:21,400 --> 00:19:24,079
Speaker 1: How do you even attempt something like that? Secretly? The

367
00:19:24,119 --> 00:19:25,200
Soviets must have been watching.

368
00:19:25,200 --> 00:19:27,319
Speaker 2: And that's where the cover story comes in, and it

369
00:19:27,440 --> 00:19:31,920
was brilliant. The CIA commissioned a custom built, highly specialized

370
00:19:31,960 --> 00:19:35,039
recovery ship, the Hughes Glomar.

371
00:19:34,680 --> 00:19:37,799
Speaker 1: Explorer Hughes as in Howard Hughes exactly.

372
00:19:38,200 --> 00:19:40,720
Speaker 2: They claimed the ship was owned by the eccentric billionaire

373
00:19:40,759 --> 00:19:43,960
Howard Hughes and that it was built for deep sea mining,

374
00:19:44,359 --> 00:19:49,000
specifically mining manganese nodules from the ocean floor. The name

375
00:19:49,119 --> 00:19:52,599
Glomar even stood for Global Marine. It was all an

376
00:19:52,640 --> 00:19:53,720
elaborate front.

377
00:19:53,640 --> 00:19:56,559
Speaker 1: A plausible cover for a weird ship doing weird things

378
00:19:56,599 --> 00:19:57,480
in the middle of the ocean.

379
00:19:57,519 --> 00:20:00,960
Speaker 2: Precisely and The ship itself was an engineering marble designed

380
00:20:01,000 --> 00:20:04,519
for this covert purpose. It was incredibly stable in rough seas,

381
00:20:05,000 --> 00:20:09,400
and crucially, it had a massive hidden cavity beneath the waterline,

382
00:20:09,799 --> 00:20:11,200
an internal moon pool.

383
00:20:11,440 --> 00:20:12,559
Speaker 1: A moon pool what for?

384
00:20:13,000 --> 00:20:16,559
Speaker 2: It allowed the CIA to secretly lower a gigantic custom

385
00:20:16,599 --> 00:20:22,079
built mechanical claw. Its internal nickname was Clementine, thousands and thousands.

386
00:20:21,720 --> 00:20:24,000
Speaker 1: Of feet down to the red A giant claw.

387
00:20:23,839 --> 00:20:27,920
Speaker 2: A giant claw. The plan was to grab the sunken submarine,

388
00:20:28,279 --> 00:20:31,000
lift it up, pull it inside the ship, through the

389
00:20:31,000 --> 00:20:34,759
moon pool, and seal the whole thing away, all while

390
00:20:34,839 --> 00:20:39,240
Soviet surveillance ships were constantly nearby watching the glomars supposed

391
00:20:39,400 --> 00:20:40,559
mining operations.

392
00:20:40,759 --> 00:20:43,119
Speaker 1: That sounds absolutely insane. Did it work?

393
00:20:43,279 --> 00:20:48,680
Speaker 2: The ambition was colossal. The execution, unfortunately, was a catastrophic failure.

394
00:20:48,759 --> 00:20:50,079
Speaker 1: Oh no, what happened?

395
00:20:50,519 --> 00:20:54,200
Speaker 2: Despite all the incredible engineering, all the secrecy, the billions

396
00:20:54,240 --> 00:20:59,920
spent that giant mechanical claw, Clementine suffered a major structural fail.

397
00:21:00,359 --> 00:21:01,359
Part way through the lift.

398
00:21:01,519 --> 00:21:03,680
Speaker 1: It broke. While holding this up.

399
00:21:03,640 --> 00:21:05,640
Speaker 2: It broke. The result was that two thirds of the

400
00:21:05,640 --> 00:21:08,480
Soviet summer in the most valuable parts, containing the missiles

401
00:21:08,480 --> 00:21:11,480
and encryption gear broke away and sank right back down

402
00:21:11,559 --> 00:21:13,200
to the abyssle plane lost forever.

403
00:21:13,400 --> 00:21:16,400
Speaker 1: Oh wow, So it was a total failure, billions.

404
00:21:15,960 --> 00:21:18,680
Speaker 2: Wasted, not a total wash out, but a huge disappointment.

405
00:21:18,960 --> 00:21:21,720
They did manage to salvage a smaller thirty eight foot

406
00:21:21,759 --> 00:21:23,440
section of the K one to twenty nine s BOO.

407
00:21:23,519 --> 00:21:24,720
Speaker 1: Anything useful in that part?

408
00:21:25,039 --> 00:21:29,839
Speaker 2: Yes, according to the sources, that section contained invaluable intelligence,

409
00:21:29,920 --> 00:21:35,160
including two nuclear torpedoes, and also, tragically, the bodies of

410
00:21:35,279 --> 00:21:36,720
six Soviet crewmen.

411
00:21:37,279 --> 00:21:38,119
Speaker 1: What happened to them?

412
00:21:38,400 --> 00:21:41,319
Speaker 2: They were given a formal military burial at sea by

413
00:21:41,359 --> 00:21:43,839
the US crew. It was actually filmed, apparently as a

414
00:21:43,839 --> 00:21:47,880
potential diplomatic gesture. Later, the ship's bell was also recovered,

415
00:21:47,880 --> 00:21:50,000
and that was eventually returned to the Soviets years later,

416
00:21:50,039 --> 00:21:53,440
though the recovery itself wasn't publicly acknowledged until the nineteen nineties.

417
00:21:53,920 --> 00:21:57,000
Speaker 1: So some intel, but not the main prize. What was

418
00:21:57,039 --> 00:22:00,359
the price tag on this partial success, partial fur failure.

419
00:22:00,519 --> 00:22:02,920
Speaker 2: That's where it really stings. When you adjust for inflation,

420
00:22:03,039 --> 00:22:06,039
the entire operation costs the equivalent of five point one

421
00:22:06,119 --> 00:22:07,519
billion dollars in today's money.

422
00:22:07,519 --> 00:22:09,759
Speaker 1: Five point one billion dollars YEP.

423
00:22:10,119 --> 00:22:12,440
Speaker 2: For a thirty eight foot section. It was a high stakes,

424
00:22:12,519 --> 00:22:16,680
high tech gamble. It successfully confirmed US acoustic tracking superiority

425
00:22:16,720 --> 00:22:19,279
was leagues ahead of the Soviets, which was valuable in itself,

426
00:22:19,599 --> 00:22:22,599
but the primary goal of recovering the core Soviet technology

427
00:22:22,759 --> 00:22:23,480
mostly failed.

428
00:22:23,519 --> 00:22:27,640
Speaker 1: Okay, five point one billion on a maybe achievable engineering feat.

429
00:22:28,000 --> 00:22:31,359
What about spending on things that were less based in reality?

430
00:22:31,720 --> 00:22:36,599
Speaker 2: Ah, well, if we're talking about expensive speculative failures, we

431
00:22:36,720 --> 00:22:40,480
absolutely have to pivot now to the Stargate project Progate.

432
00:22:41,160 --> 00:22:41,680
Speaker 1: Not the movie.

433
00:22:41,759 --> 00:22:44,279
Speaker 2: Uh huh No, not the movie, though maybe just as

434
00:22:44,319 --> 00:22:48,119
fantastical in its own way. Project's Stargate was a real

435
00:22:48,240 --> 00:22:52,440
defense intelligence agency program. It ran for decades, starting roughly

436
00:22:52,480 --> 00:22:55,079
in the post nineteen seventies era, all the way up

437
00:22:55,160 --> 00:22:56,359
until nineteen ninety five.

438
00:22:56,799 --> 00:22:58,920
Speaker 1: And what was its premise? What were they trying to do?

439
00:22:59,319 --> 00:23:03,880
Speaker 2: The core was simple, if mind boggling could psychic powers

440
00:23:03,880 --> 00:23:07,880
the paranormal provide a genuine Cold War intelligence advantage.

441
00:23:07,400 --> 00:23:09,880
Speaker 1: Psychic powers like est telekinesis.

442
00:23:10,000 --> 00:23:14,079
Speaker 2: Yes, seriously, seriously and crucially, this wasn't some friend under

443
00:23:14,079 --> 00:23:17,680
the radar thing. It was treated as a serious military effort.

444
00:23:17,759 --> 00:23:22,039
It employed actual intelligence officers scientists and receive substantial, consistent

445
00:23:22,079 --> 00:23:24,160
federal funding for over two decades.

446
00:23:24,519 --> 00:23:26,440
Speaker 1: What on earth made them think this was a good

447
00:23:26,519 --> 00:23:28,440
use of resources? Was there some evidence?

448
00:23:28,519 --> 00:23:30,960
Speaker 2: The initial spark, according to our sources, seems to have

449
00:23:31,000 --> 00:23:34,119
been Cold War paranoia mixed with flimsy evidence. There was

450
00:23:34,160 --> 00:23:38,119
apparently a video circulating allegedly showing a Russian girl performing

451
00:23:38,119 --> 00:23:41,359
psychic feats. Now later analysis revealed it was just simple

452
00:23:41,400 --> 00:23:45,400
camera trickery, but the fear took root immediately. What if

453
00:23:45,440 --> 00:23:49,119
the Soviets are developing psychic spies. We can't fall behind,

454
00:23:49,240 --> 00:23:51,920
even if it seems crazy. We have to investigate it.

455
00:23:52,240 --> 00:23:54,799
We need to understand the capability gap.

456
00:23:54,680 --> 00:23:57,440
Speaker 1: Classic Cold War. We must do it because they might

457
00:23:57,480 --> 00:23:58,079
be doing it.

458
00:23:58,480 --> 00:24:02,920
Speaker 2: Thinking textbook, so Stargate got underway with three main goals.

459
00:24:03,160 --> 00:24:04,279
Speaker 1: Okay, what were they?

460
00:24:04,319 --> 00:24:10,160
Speaker 2: First? Rigorously test if remote viewing supposedly seeing things far

461
00:24:10,200 --> 00:24:13,680
away with your mind, could actually gather actionable intelligence on

462
00:24:13,880 --> 00:24:17,799
foreign targets, like could a psychic describe a hidden Soviet

463
00:24:17,880 --> 00:24:22,480
missile silo? Second, second, figure out if rival nations, specifically

464
00:24:22,559 --> 00:24:27,119
the Soviets, were actually developing these abilities themselves intelligence and counterintelligence.

465
00:24:27,160 --> 00:24:31,680
And third, third run laboratory experiments try to scientifically understand

466
00:24:31,720 --> 00:24:34,759
psychic phenomena and maybe even find ways to improve psychic

467
00:24:34,799 --> 00:24:38,079
performance for real world military or intelligence applications.

468
00:24:38,160 --> 00:24:40,160
Speaker 1: So they were really trying to train psychic spies. What

469
00:24:40,240 --> 00:24:41,559
kind of powers were they looking for?

470
00:24:41,759 --> 00:24:44,000
Speaker 2: Oh, the list sounds like something out of a comic book.

471
00:24:44,440 --> 00:24:47,079
Remote viewing was the main focus, but they also explored

472
00:24:47,119 --> 00:24:51,839
telekinesis moving objects with the mind, pyrokinesis starting fires.

473
00:24:51,440 --> 00:24:53,920
Speaker 1: With the mind, starting fires with your mind that was

474
00:24:53,960 --> 00:24:54,759
on the list.

475
00:24:54,720 --> 00:24:57,920
Speaker 2: And even the really chilling idea of potentially killing someone

476
00:24:58,079 --> 00:24:59,759
using only concentrated thought.

477
00:25:00,039 --> 00:25:03,599
Speaker 1: This this is wild. Hmmm, who are they studying? Did they

478
00:25:03,599 --> 00:25:05,200
find anyone with these powers?

479
00:25:05,359 --> 00:25:09,480
Speaker 2: They spent significant time and money studying various self proclaimed

480
00:25:09,519 --> 00:25:13,680
psychic prodigies, famous names like the spoon Bender Eurie Geller

481
00:25:13,720 --> 00:25:17,559
were involved. Also an eccentric figure named Ingo Swan who

482
00:25:17,599 --> 00:25:20,039
reportedly coined the term remote viewing and.

483
00:25:20,119 --> 00:25:22,000
Speaker 1: Was a key subject Uri Geller.

484
00:25:22,519 --> 00:25:25,799
Speaker 2: Seriously, the methods involve having these individuals try to sketch

485
00:25:25,839 --> 00:25:29,799
locations or describe events happening at distant, secret foreign military

486
00:25:29,839 --> 00:25:34,119
bases while observers monitored their physiological responses trying to find correlations.

487
00:25:34,319 --> 00:25:36,079
Speaker 1: Work did they get any useful intel.

488
00:25:36,279 --> 00:25:42,039
Speaker 2: The operational results were consistently useless. Remote viewers could sometimes

489
00:25:42,039 --> 00:25:45,960
sketch vague geographical features, maybe get a sense of water

490
00:25:46,279 --> 00:25:49,680
or buildings, but the level of detail was never specific

491
00:25:49,799 --> 00:25:51,680
enough to be actionable intelligence.

492
00:25:51,720 --> 00:25:54,359
Speaker 1: You know, the secret documents are in the third drawer down.

493
00:25:54,480 --> 00:25:57,960
Speaker 2: Nothing like that. The occasional hit where a description seemed

494
00:25:58,079 --> 00:26:02,599
vaguely accurate was usually explainable by chance or the viewer

495
00:26:02,640 --> 00:26:05,599
having some basic background knowledge of the type of target

496
00:26:05,640 --> 00:26:08,640
they were asked about. It wasn't statistically significant.

497
00:26:08,680 --> 00:26:12,240
Speaker 1: So after decades of trying, what was the conclusion?

498
00:26:12,680 --> 00:26:15,440
Speaker 2: The project was finally shut down in nineteen ninety five.

499
00:26:16,000 --> 00:26:18,799
A formal assessment was done by an external team including

500
00:26:18,880 --> 00:26:23,559
respected scientists. Their verdict was blunt and definitive quote no

501
00:26:23,680 --> 00:26:25,880
good came of any kind of psychic research on the

502
00:26:26,000 --> 00:26:27,240
US taxpayer's dime.

503
00:26:27,440 --> 00:26:30,119
Speaker 1: Twenty five years and nothing.

504
00:26:30,039 --> 00:26:32,680
Speaker 2: Nothing useful. They spent a quarter of a century attempting

505
00:26:32,759 --> 00:26:35,759
to prove psychic abilities could be weaponized for military use,

506
00:26:36,000 --> 00:26:40,039
and they failed unequivocally. It was deemed an embarrassing cautionary

507
00:26:40,079 --> 00:26:42,519
tale of irresponsible military spending.

508
00:26:42,640 --> 00:26:44,920
Speaker 1: Wow, that's quite the contrast with the Zurian.

509
00:26:45,000 --> 00:26:49,960
Speaker 2: Isn't it a powerful contrast? Absolutely? You have Azorian massive

510
00:26:50,519 --> 00:26:55,119
financial and engineering investment in something physically plausible, though incredibly difficult,

511
00:26:55,480 --> 00:26:58,720
high risk physics and engineering, right, and then you have Stargate,

512
00:26:59,119 --> 00:27:04,599
an equivalent sustained speculative investment based almost entirely on paranormal

513
00:27:04,599 --> 00:27:08,119
belief in cold warfare. It really speaks volumes about the

514
00:27:08,200 --> 00:27:11,319
level of desperation during that era, the pressure to gain

515
00:27:11,400 --> 00:27:14,200
any edge over the Soviet Union, even if it meant

516
00:27:14,279 --> 00:27:16,759
betting billions on telekinesis and remote viewing.

517
00:27:16,839 --> 00:27:20,200
Speaker 1: Okay, So the common thread in Missorian Stargate se spray,

518
00:27:20,519 --> 00:27:24,519
It's all about controlling information, keeping secrets in sometimes trying

519
00:27:24,559 --> 00:27:26,519
to shape public perception exactly.

520
00:27:26,599 --> 00:27:27,720
Speaker 2: Secrecy is the currency.

521
00:27:28,039 --> 00:27:30,279
Speaker 1: So now let's move to how the government tried to

522
00:27:30,279 --> 00:27:33,799
manage its internal image and information flow and crucially those

523
00:27:33,799 --> 00:27:37,200
moments when that control just completely failed broke wide open.

524
00:27:37,440 --> 00:27:39,519
Speaker 2: Right. And let's start with a figure you wouldn't normally

525
00:27:39,519 --> 00:27:42,839
associate with FBI informants, Walter Disney.

526
00:27:42,480 --> 00:27:46,079
Speaker 1: Walt Disney, Mickey Mouse worked with the FBI, not.

527
00:27:46,160 --> 00:27:48,720
Speaker 2: Just worked with them. He was a dedicated, close working

528
00:27:48,759 --> 00:27:52,599
ally and informant for the FBI. Director Jay Edgar Hoover, get.

529
00:27:52,519 --> 00:27:55,160
Speaker 1: Out seriously, what was he informing on?

530
00:27:55,599 --> 00:27:59,400
Speaker 2: This alliance wasn't just friendly, it was operational. Disney was

531
00:27:59,440 --> 00:28:03,279
a staunch capitalist, fiercely anti communists, and very anti union.

532
00:28:03,640 --> 00:28:07,920
Hoover leveraged that. Disney eagerly snitched as the sources put it,

533
00:28:08,240 --> 00:28:11,799
on anyone he perceived as a communist, agitator or hew

534
00:28:11,920 --> 00:28:15,160
left wing views within the entertainment industry. He used his

535
00:28:15,319 --> 00:28:18,640
influence and access to Hoover to help the FBI root

536
00:28:18,640 --> 00:28:22,119
out descent in Hollywood and actively worked to bust unions

537
00:28:22,160 --> 00:28:24,640
during labor disputes at his own studio. So he was

538
00:28:24,680 --> 00:28:29,559
naming names to Hoover, naming names, providing information absolutely, and

539
00:28:29,680 --> 00:28:32,759
his role went beyond just being an informant. Disney actually

540
00:28:32,759 --> 00:28:35,960
allowed Hoover to have input on creative decisions in some

541
00:28:36,000 --> 00:28:39,119
of his films. Hoover was dictating movie content to ensure

542
00:28:39,119 --> 00:28:43,119
they aligned with the FBI's ideological stance, essentially weaving government

543
00:28:43,119 --> 00:28:46,480
approved messaging subtly into popular culture. It was a mutually

544
00:28:46,519 --> 00:28:48,000
beneficial relationship for them.

545
00:28:48,039 --> 00:28:51,240
Speaker 1: How close was this relationship did Disney have any official status?

546
00:28:51,519 --> 00:28:54,279
Speaker 2: He became such a trusted asset that in nineteen fifty four,

547
00:28:54,359 --> 00:28:57,359
Hoover gave him the rare privilege of being titled a

548
00:28:57,440 --> 00:29:02,079
Special Agent in Charge Contact. That's amal designation Wow. And furthermore,

549
00:29:02,200 --> 00:29:06,160
Disney was granted permission to film inside FBI headquarters and offices,

550
00:29:06,279 --> 00:29:09,400
a huge deal at the time given Hoover's obsession with

551
00:29:09,519 --> 00:29:10,960
secrecy and image control.

552
00:29:11,200 --> 00:29:13,799
Speaker 1: Did Disney use this connection for his own purposes?

553
00:29:13,880 --> 00:29:18,319
Speaker 2: Oh? Absolutely, He weaponized the government's anti communist paranoia for

554
00:29:18,359 --> 00:29:21,640
his own gain. He uses political muscle during a bitter

555
00:29:21,720 --> 00:29:25,039
studio strike back in nineteen forty one to pressure his opponents, and.

556
00:29:25,000 --> 00:29:28,240
Speaker 1: The naming name's part, did that have real consequences for people?

557
00:29:28,319 --> 00:29:32,160
Speaker 2: Devastating consequences. Most notoriously, he later ruined the careers and

558
00:29:32,200 --> 00:29:35,200
lives of several animators by directly recommending them to the

559
00:29:35,240 --> 00:29:37,559
House on American Activities Committee.

560
00:29:37,240 --> 00:29:39,599
Speaker 1: HUAC McCarthy's committee.

561
00:29:39,200 --> 00:29:42,559
Speaker 2: The very same His detailed reports to the FBI naming

562
00:29:42,640 --> 00:29:46,200
names and outlining suspicions only came to light publicly decades

563
00:29:46,279 --> 00:29:49,960
later in the nineteen nineties through Freedom of Information Act requests.

564
00:29:50,160 --> 00:29:53,640
Speaker 1: So you have this icon of American entertainment actively working

565
00:29:53,640 --> 00:29:57,960
with the government to enforce control to enforce ideological purity

566
00:29:58,000 --> 00:29:58,400
within his.

567
00:29:58,400 --> 00:30:02,640
Speaker 2: Industry, exactly, use secrecy and government power to suppress dissent.

568
00:30:02,839 --> 00:30:06,000
Speaker 1: Now, let's look at the polar opposite, someone inside the

569
00:30:06,039 --> 00:30:09,759
system who risked absolutely everything to break that control, to

570
00:30:09,799 --> 00:30:10,920
expose the secrets.

571
00:30:11,000 --> 00:30:13,079
Speaker 2: Right, we have to talk about Daniel Ellsberg and the

572
00:30:13,079 --> 00:30:13,920
Pentagon Papers.

573
00:30:13,960 --> 00:30:17,000
Speaker 1: The Pentagon Papers. Yeah, a huge moment in history. How

574
00:30:17,000 --> 00:30:17,640
did that start?

575
00:30:17,799 --> 00:30:21,160
Speaker 2: It started ironically from within the government itself. Back in

576
00:30:21,240 --> 00:30:24,400
nineteen sixty seven, the Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara was

577
00:30:24,480 --> 00:30:27,599
drawing deeply disillusioned with how the Vietnam War was going okay,

578
00:30:27,680 --> 00:30:30,440
So he commissioned a top secret study group, the Vietnam

579
00:30:30,519 --> 00:30:35,880
Study Task Force. Their explicit goal compile a comprehensive, accurate,

580
00:30:35,960 --> 00:30:39,240
and exhaustive history of American involvement and decision making in

581
00:30:39,359 --> 00:30:41,079
Vietnam from the very beginning.

582
00:30:41,119 --> 00:30:42,200
Speaker 1: Why what was the purpose?

583
00:30:42,599 --> 00:30:46,839
Speaker 2: The stated goal was brutally honest self assessment. To create

584
00:30:46,880 --> 00:30:50,799
a detailed record, purely for internal use, so that future

585
00:30:50,839 --> 00:30:54,640
generations of policymakers could understand precisely how and why the

586
00:30:54,640 --> 00:30:57,720
war had gone so wrong? What were the key decision points,

587
00:30:57,720 --> 00:30:58,839
where were the mistakes made?

588
00:30:59,000 --> 00:31:01,920
Speaker 1: So an internal aught of the war essentially yes.

589
00:31:02,240 --> 00:31:06,720
Speaker 2: The result was this immense, top secret report, over seven

590
00:31:06,799 --> 00:31:11,119
thousand pages long, spanning forty volumes. It was completed under

591
00:31:11,160 --> 00:31:14,400
intense security near the end of Lyndon B. Johnson's presidency

592
00:31:14,759 --> 00:31:17,599
and covered US involvement from nineteen forty five right up

593
00:31:17,640 --> 00:31:18,759
to nineteen sixty seven.

594
00:31:18,880 --> 00:31:20,519
Speaker 1: And Elsburg where does he fit in?

595
00:31:20,880 --> 00:31:23,920
Speaker 2: Daniel Ellsberg was a former military analyst working at the

596
00:31:24,000 --> 00:31:27,400
Rand Corporation, a think tank with deep ties to the military.

597
00:31:27,920 --> 00:31:30,000
He was one of the very few people outside the

598
00:31:30,000 --> 00:31:32,759
core team who had the high level security clearance needed

599
00:31:32,759 --> 00:31:35,640
to read the entire study. And as Elsberg read these

600
00:31:35,680 --> 00:31:39,039
thousands of pages and simultaneously watched the war continue to escalate,

601
00:31:39,599 --> 00:31:43,160
US casualties mount and public support crumble, he had a

602
00:31:43,200 --> 00:31:44,119
crisis of conscience.

603
00:31:44,160 --> 00:31:45,160
Speaker 1: What did the papers show him?

604
00:31:45,279 --> 00:31:49,279
Speaker 2: They showed him unequivocally that the war was feeling But

605
00:31:49,319 --> 00:31:53,519
more importantly, they showed that successive US governments Truman, Eisenhower,

606
00:31:53,599 --> 00:31:57,839
Kennedy Johnson had systematically lied not just to the public

607
00:31:57,960 --> 00:32:01,759
but to Congress itself about the the true scale, the origins,

608
00:32:01,799 --> 00:32:03,119
and the prospects of the war.

609
00:32:03,440 --> 00:32:05,799
Speaker 1: Lies about what specifically.

610
00:32:05,319 --> 00:32:12,160
Speaker 2: Concealing covert military operations, downplaying failures, misrepresenting enemy strength, obscuring

611
00:32:12,240 --> 00:32:15,240
the long history of US support for French colonial forces

612
00:32:15,279 --> 00:32:18,480
way back in the forties and fifties, covertly training South

613
00:32:18,559 --> 00:32:23,720
Vietnamese soldiers long before the official escalation. The core revelation

614
00:32:23,920 --> 00:32:26,279
was that the government knew the war was likely unwinnable

615
00:32:26,359 --> 00:32:28,920
or at least far harder than they admitted, yet continued

616
00:32:28,960 --> 00:32:31,839
to escalate it while telling the public a very different story.

617
00:32:31,880 --> 00:32:34,440
Speaker 1: So Elsberg is reading this knowing it proves the government

618
00:32:34,440 --> 00:32:37,599
has been lying on a massive scale. What does he do?

619
00:32:37,839 --> 00:32:41,079
Speaker 2: This is where that internal tension you mentioned becomes incredibly dramatic.

620
00:32:41,240 --> 00:32:43,599
Elsberg came to believe his loyalty to the truth and

621
00:32:43,680 --> 00:32:46,839
to the American public being deceived outweighed his legal obligation

622
00:32:46,920 --> 00:32:50,519
to protect classified information, his oath to the Constitution. He

623
00:32:50,559 --> 00:32:55,400
felt trumped his secrecy agreements a huge decision monumental. In

624
00:32:55,519 --> 00:32:59,200
nineteen seventy one, he secretly photocopied thousands of pages of

625
00:32:59,240 --> 00:33:02,960
the Pentagon Page and passed sections of them to a

626
00:33:03,000 --> 00:33:04,319
reporter at the New York Times.

627
00:33:04,359 --> 00:33:06,920
Speaker 1: Neil Sheehan and The Times published they did.

628
00:33:07,279 --> 00:33:11,559
Speaker 2: The published expose was absolutely devastating. It sent shockwaves through

629
00:33:11,559 --> 00:33:12,759
the country and the world.

630
00:33:12,960 --> 00:33:15,319
Speaker 1: What was the immediate impact Politically?

631
00:33:15,680 --> 00:33:19,160
Speaker 2: It was catastrophic for the Nixon administration. Even though the

632
00:33:19,240 --> 00:33:23,799
lies predated him. It permanently shattered public faith in government

633
00:33:23,839 --> 00:33:27,759
pronouncements about the war. Support for the war plummeted even further.

634
00:33:28,039 --> 00:33:30,279
It fundamentally changed the national conversation.

635
00:33:30,480 --> 00:33:32,960
Speaker 1: What happened to Elsburg? He must have faced serious charges.

636
00:33:33,039 --> 00:33:36,799
Speaker 2: Oh, he did. He was charged with conspiracy, espionage, theft

637
00:33:36,839 --> 00:33:41,640
of government property. He faced decades potentially life in prison.

638
00:33:41,359 --> 00:33:42,359
Speaker 1: But he wasn't convicted.

639
00:33:42,559 --> 00:33:46,920
Speaker 2: The charges were ultimately dismissed. Why because the government itself

640
00:33:47,000 --> 00:33:51,119
engaged in serious misconduct during the prosecution. The Nixon White

641
00:33:51,119 --> 00:33:54,759
House had authorized illegal wire tax against Elsburg and even

642
00:33:54,799 --> 00:33:57,920
a break in at his psychiatrist's office. The infamous Plumbers

643
00:33:58,000 --> 00:34:00,839
Unit was involved. When this came out, the judge declared

644
00:34:00,839 --> 00:34:04,000
a mistrial and dismissed all charges due to governmental misconduct

645
00:34:04,039 --> 00:34:04,799
tainting the case.

646
00:34:05,079 --> 00:34:07,960
Speaker 1: Wow. So the government's attempts to silence him.

647
00:34:08,119 --> 00:34:12,440
Speaker 2: Backfire spectacularly, and years later, even Robert McNamara, the man

648
00:34:12,440 --> 00:34:15,599
who commissioned the study, admitted he did it partly because

649
00:34:15,639 --> 00:34:18,559
he already believed the war was doomed by nineteen sixty

650
00:34:18,599 --> 00:34:21,000
seven and wanted the historical record strait.

651
00:34:21,199 --> 00:34:25,840
Speaker 1: So the juxtaposition is just incredible. Disney the icon working

652
00:34:25,840 --> 00:34:28,239
with the state to enforce secrecy and control.

653
00:34:28,239 --> 00:34:31,679
Speaker 2: Using government paranoia for his own ends, reinforcing the.

654
00:34:31,639 --> 00:34:35,840
Speaker 1: System, and Elsburg the insider, weaponizing the government's own classified

655
00:34:35,840 --> 00:34:39,400
facts against the state to enforce public accountability.

656
00:34:38,960 --> 00:34:42,440
Speaker 2: Breaking the system open from within. It really highlights that

657
00:34:42,480 --> 00:34:46,239
fundamental tension in a democracy that relies heavily on secrecy,

658
00:34:46,920 --> 00:34:50,639
where does loyalty truly lie with the institution or with

659
00:34:50,760 --> 00:34:54,400
the public and the truth. Elsberg forced that question into

660
00:34:54,400 --> 00:34:56,159
the open like never before.

661
00:34:56,679 --> 00:35:02,280
Speaker 1: Okay, we've covered biological tests, propaganda, billion dollar heists, psychic spies,

662
00:35:02,360 --> 00:35:05,840
and foremants whistleblowers. Now let's get to the operations that

663
00:35:06,000 --> 00:35:09,239
really push the envelope, the ones that show the most extreme,

664
00:35:09,400 --> 00:35:13,480
maybe desperate, and sometimes morally terrifying lengths government planners were

665
00:35:13,480 --> 00:35:15,360
willing to consider to achieve their goal.

666
00:35:15,559 --> 00:35:18,320
Speaker 2: Right, these are the plans that reveal the absolute outer

667
00:35:18,400 --> 00:35:22,920
boundaries of classified thinking, where necessity or perceived necessities seem

668
00:35:23,000 --> 00:35:24,960
to override almost everything.

669
00:35:24,559 --> 00:35:28,639
Speaker 1: Else and nothing quite demonstrates sheer persistence, maybe obsession and

670
00:35:28,760 --> 00:35:32,199
ultimately futility, like the decade's long effort to get rid

671
00:35:32,199 --> 00:35:33,079
of Fidel Castro.

672
00:35:33,239 --> 00:35:36,079
Speaker 2: Oh, the Castra applauds, it's almost a genre onto itself.

673
00:35:36,599 --> 00:35:40,639
The CIA, often working with let's say, less reliable partners

674
00:35:40,639 --> 00:35:44,639
like mafia figures and disgruntled Cuban dissidents, spent decades trying

675
00:35:44,639 --> 00:35:46,639
to assassinate the leader of Communist Cuba.

676
00:35:46,960 --> 00:35:48,960
Speaker 1: Decades. How many attempts are we talking about?

677
00:35:49,119 --> 00:35:52,639
Speaker 2: The official estimate compiled by a Cuban official who used

678
00:35:52,639 --> 00:35:55,960
to run Castro's security detail is six hundred and thirty

679
00:35:55,960 --> 00:35:59,039
four thirty four failed attempts.

680
00:35:58,880 --> 00:36:02,239
Speaker 1: Six hundred and thirty four or confirmed failed attempts. According

681
00:36:02,280 --> 00:36:06,039
to that source, it became this bizarre marathon, starting with

682
00:36:06,079 --> 00:36:09,880
somewhat conventional plots and quickly descending into the utterly absurd,

683
00:36:10,039 --> 00:36:13,239
almost cartoonish if it weren't deadly serious and intent.

684
00:36:13,440 --> 00:36:16,760
Speaker 2: Give us some examples beyond just you know, shooting out.

685
00:36:16,840 --> 00:36:20,280
Speaker 1: Oh, they got creative. They tried spiking his beloved cigars

686
00:36:20,320 --> 00:36:23,840
with potent baculinum toxin. The idea was he'd light up

687
00:36:23,920 --> 00:36:24,920
inhial and die.

688
00:36:25,039 --> 00:36:25,679
Speaker 2: Did it work?

689
00:36:25,920 --> 00:36:29,480
Speaker 1: Nope? Apparently the assassin task with delivering the poisoned cigars

690
00:36:30,000 --> 00:36:32,199
lost them. They never reached Castro.

691
00:36:32,400 --> 00:36:33,920
Speaker 2: You can't make this stuff up? What else?

692
00:36:34,000 --> 00:36:39,280
Speaker 1: Okay? When direct poisoning failed, they got environmental. Castro loved diving,

693
00:36:39,400 --> 00:36:42,840
so one plan involved hiding a bomb inside a large,

694
00:36:43,159 --> 00:36:46,320
beautifully painted seashell. The hope was it would attract his

695
00:36:46,320 --> 00:36:49,400
attention while he was underwater. He'd pick it up and boom.

696
00:36:49,119 --> 00:36:53,400
Speaker 2: And exploding seashell. Seriously, seriously. If that didn't work, maybe

697
00:36:53,400 --> 00:36:57,360
a debilitating skin disease. They planned to contaminate one of

698
00:36:57,360 --> 00:37:00,519
his custom diving suits with a fungus designed to give

699
00:37:00,599 --> 00:37:03,480
him a nasty, chronic skin condition. May be forcing him

700
00:37:03,480 --> 00:37:04,559
out of the public eye.

701
00:37:04,679 --> 00:37:06,559
Speaker 1: Gross more spy movie stuff.

702
00:37:06,599 --> 00:37:11,599
Speaker 2: Absolutely Another classic concealing a deadly hypodermic needle filled with

703
00:37:11,719 --> 00:37:16,000
poison inside a seemingly normal ballpoint pen for an assassin

704
00:37:16,039 --> 00:37:17,360
to use in close quarters.

705
00:37:17,480 --> 00:37:20,079
Speaker 1: These sound like rejected James Bond plots.

706
00:37:20,199 --> 00:37:22,519
Speaker 2: Some of them really do. The sheer range of these

707
00:37:22,559 --> 00:37:26,679
attempts just highlights this pathological focus on one single target.

708
00:37:26,920 --> 00:37:31,199
It suggests, frankly, an incredible level of organizational dysfunction, This

709
00:37:31,320 --> 00:37:34,639
belief that if you just keep throwing increasingly ridiculous ideas

710
00:37:34,639 --> 00:37:36,480
at the problem. Eventually, one has to work.

711
00:37:36,599 --> 00:37:39,000
Speaker 1: Were they all lethal or were some just aimed at

712
00:37:39,039 --> 00:37:39,920
discrediting him?

713
00:37:40,000 --> 00:37:44,000
Speaker 2: Not all releasal, Some were purely psychological warfare, designed for humiliation,

714
00:37:44,440 --> 00:37:47,360
hoping to destabilize his public image and authority like what

715
00:37:47,719 --> 00:37:51,559
One plan involved using thallium salts, a chemical that causes

716
00:37:51,599 --> 00:37:55,039
hair loss, possibly delivered through his shoes or dusting powder,

717
00:37:55,920 --> 00:37:59,599
the goal to make his iconic beard a potent symbol

718
00:37:59,599 --> 00:38:03,719
of the Cue revolution fallout. The thinking was the humiliation

719
00:38:03,880 --> 00:38:04,760
might destroy his.

720
00:38:04,760 --> 00:38:07,239
Speaker 1: Charisma, Meggie's beard, fallout.

721
00:38:07,079 --> 00:38:12,119
Speaker 2: And maybe even stranger. Another plot involved pumping hallucinogenic gas

722
00:38:12,159 --> 00:38:15,480
something like LSD into the ventilation system of a radio

723
00:38:15,559 --> 00:38:18,440
recording booth while he was delivering one of his famously

724
00:38:18,559 --> 00:38:21,880
long national address naming came sound crazy on air, exactly

725
00:38:22,039 --> 00:38:26,000
make him seem incoherent manic, completely losing his grips, thus

726
00:38:26,039 --> 00:38:29,119
discrediting him in front of the entire nation. The desperation

727
00:38:29,239 --> 00:38:31,719
behind these plans is just staggering, but.

728
00:38:31,760 --> 00:38:34,280
Speaker 1: Ultimately they all failed six hundred and thirty four times.

729
00:38:34,280 --> 00:38:37,480
Speaker 2: All failed due to incompetence, terrible luck for the plotters,

730
00:38:37,519 --> 00:38:40,280
maybe Castro's own security being better than credited or just

731
00:38:40,320 --> 00:38:42,440
the sheer absurdity of the plans themselves.

732
00:38:42,519 --> 00:38:46,079
Speaker 1: Okay, so the Castro plans represent absurdity and failure. But

733
00:38:46,159 --> 00:38:48,800
there was another plan from that era aimed at Cuba

734
00:38:48,960 --> 00:38:53,239
that wasn't absurd. He was freateningly sophisticated, highly organized, and

735
00:38:53,360 --> 00:38:54,360
morally terrifying.

736
00:38:54,679 --> 00:38:57,400
Speaker 2: And it failed only because of a single decision made

737
00:38:57,400 --> 00:39:01,000
at the very highest level. You're talking about Operation Norwoods.

738
00:39:00,519 --> 00:39:04,079
Speaker 1: Operation Northwoods. This one, this one is genuinely chilling. Tell

739
00:39:04,159 --> 00:39:04,639
us about it.

740
00:39:05,199 --> 00:39:08,159
Speaker 2: This takes us to the lowest point ethically speaking, in

741
00:39:08,199 --> 00:39:11,199
our deep dive today. In the early nineteen sixties, this

742
00:39:11,360 --> 00:39:14,880
was post Bay of Pig's failure. Tensions with Cuba were

743
00:39:15,000 --> 00:39:18,960
sky high. The US Department of Defense, specifically the Joint

744
00:39:19,039 --> 00:39:23,760
Chiefs of Staff, formally proposed staging false flag terrorist attacks

745
00:39:23,760 --> 00:39:24,719
on American soil.

746
00:39:24,920 --> 00:39:26,679
Speaker 1: False flag attacks meaning.

747
00:39:26,559 --> 00:39:28,760
Speaker 2: Meaning attacks designed to look like they were carried out

748
00:39:28,760 --> 00:39:32,239
by Cuba but actually perpetrated by the US military itself.

749
00:39:32,480 --> 00:39:34,239
Speaker 1: Why what was the objective?

750
00:39:34,440 --> 00:39:38,239
Speaker 2: The chillingly clear objective stated in the documents was to

751
00:39:38,360 --> 00:39:42,920
sway American and international public opinion to create an undeniable

752
00:39:43,079 --> 00:39:46,360
justification a cassis belly for launching a full scale military

753
00:39:46,360 --> 00:39:47,199
invasion of Cuba.

754
00:39:47,320 --> 00:39:49,679
Speaker 1: They were going to attack Americans to justify a war.

755
00:39:49,800 --> 00:39:51,280
What kind of attacks were they proposing?

756
00:39:51,480 --> 00:39:55,440
Speaker 2: These weren't just vague ideas. These were detailed, advanced plans

757
00:39:55,480 --> 00:39:59,880
submitted formally by the highest military leadership. Specific proposals in

758
00:40:00,000 --> 00:40:03,280
included staging the fake shootdown of a US civilian airliner,

759
00:40:03,599 --> 00:40:07,840
blaming it on Cuban MiGs, or even more disturbingly, sinking

760
00:40:07,880 --> 00:40:10,679
a US Navy ship in Guantanamo.

761
00:40:10,079 --> 00:40:11,360
Speaker 1: Bay thinking our own ship.

762
00:40:11,480 --> 00:40:15,400
Speaker 2: Sinking our own ship, potentially remotely controlled and unmanned, but

763
00:40:15,559 --> 00:40:18,079
making it look like a Cuban attack. And here's the

764
00:40:18,159 --> 00:40:23,519
truly cynical part. The plan explicitly included a sophisticated psychological

765
00:40:23,559 --> 00:40:27,639
warfare component. It's specifically called for publishing a fake casualty

766
00:40:27,639 --> 00:40:30,280
list in American newspapers after the stage ship.

767
00:40:30,079 --> 00:40:31,719
Speaker 1: Attack, fake dead sailors.

768
00:40:31,400 --> 00:40:34,079
Speaker 2: Fake dead sailors. The document states the goal was to

769
00:40:34,119 --> 00:40:39,480
create a helpful wave of national indignation, manufactured public outrage,

770
00:40:39,760 --> 00:40:42,840
designed solely to generate popular support for the invasion and

771
00:40:42,920 --> 00:40:44,639
war that the military leadership wanted.

772
00:40:44,760 --> 00:40:47,519
Speaker 1: That's horrifying. Who saw these plans to get approved?

773
00:40:47,559 --> 00:40:50,960
Speaker 2: These terrifyingly advanced plans signed off by the Joint Chiefs

774
00:40:50,960 --> 00:40:53,320
of Staff, actually made it all the way to the

775
00:40:53,360 --> 00:40:57,159
desk of the Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara, and ultimately

776
00:40:57,239 --> 00:40:59,800
were presented in the context of anti Castro planning to

777
00:40:59,800 --> 00:41:02,599
disc gushions involving President John F. Kennedy.

778
00:41:02,679 --> 00:41:04,559
Speaker 1: Kennedy saw this, what did he do?

779
00:41:04,760 --> 00:41:09,360
Speaker 2: And here's where history pivots mercifully. President Kennedy rejected the operation.

780
00:41:09,639 --> 00:41:13,079
He shut it down. He was reportedly appalled by the concept.

781
00:41:13,159 --> 00:41:14,000
Speaker 1: So it never happened.

782
00:41:14,079 --> 00:41:16,599
Speaker 2: It never happened. But the plan itself, the fact that

783
00:41:16,639 --> 00:41:19,719
it was formally proposed and seriously considered at the highest

784
00:41:19,800 --> 00:41:23,800
levels of the US military, that remained a closely guarded secret,

785
00:41:24,320 --> 00:41:28,199
locked away in classified files, dwelling in obscurity for nearly

786
00:41:28,320 --> 00:41:32,159
forty years until finally being declassified in the late nineteen nineties.

787
00:41:32,360 --> 00:41:35,400
Speaker 1: The contrast with the Castro plots is just stark, isn't it?

788
00:41:35,559 --> 00:41:39,639
Speaker 2: Absolutely stark? The bizarre attempts on Castro's life failed mostly

789
00:41:39,719 --> 00:41:44,760
due to incompetence or bad luck or sheer absurdity. Operation Northwoods, however,

790
00:41:44,880 --> 00:41:49,880
was a calculated, internally coherent, strategically planned proposal to intentionally

791
00:41:49,960 --> 00:41:54,039
kill American citizens to manufacture consent for war. It didn't

792
00:41:54,079 --> 00:41:56,960
fail because it was stupid. It failed because one person

793
00:41:57,000 --> 00:41:58,119
at the very top said no.

794
00:41:58,400 --> 00:42:01,840
Speaker 1: And that really forces you to ask what prevents these

795
00:42:01,960 --> 00:42:06,000
kinds of internal machinations, proposals to attack your own citizens

796
00:42:06,000 --> 00:42:09,679
for geopolitical gain. What stops them from being proposed or

797
00:42:09,719 --> 00:42:13,199
maybe even attempted? Again, it relied entirely on one person's

798
00:42:13,280 --> 00:42:13,920
judgment call.

799
00:42:14,039 --> 00:42:18,280
Speaker 2: It's a deeply unsettling question. What are the institutional guardrails really?

800
00:42:18,519 --> 00:42:21,400
Northwoods proves that the capacity for such thinking existed at

801
00:42:21,440 --> 00:42:24,440
the highest levels hashtag tag outro. So if we try

802
00:42:24,440 --> 00:42:27,159
to connect all these threads, pull back for the bigger picture,

803
00:42:27,280 --> 00:42:30,920
We've really traversed this hidden landscape of government secrecy, haven't we.

804
00:42:30,920 --> 00:42:33,119
We've seen the incredible breadth of these operations.

805
00:42:33,199 --> 00:42:36,119
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's been quite a journey, from contaminating major cities

806
00:42:36,159 --> 00:42:37,480
like San Francisco.

807
00:42:37,199 --> 00:42:40,760
Speaker 2: To co opting the press with Operation Mockingbird, to wasting

808
00:42:40,880 --> 00:42:44,639
billions trying to raise subs or chasing psychic spies right.

809
00:42:44,559 --> 00:42:48,599
Speaker 1: And even developing detailed plans like Northwoods proposing attacks on

810
00:42:48,639 --> 00:42:49,599
our own citizens.

811
00:42:49,960 --> 00:42:52,119
Speaker 2: The common thread through all of it, I think, is

812
00:42:52,159 --> 00:42:56,199
the immense, often unchecked power that gets wielded behind that

813
00:42:56,360 --> 00:43:01,039
veil of classification, and the constant struggle often failing to

814
00:43:01,159 --> 00:43:04,079
maintain ethical boundaries once that veil is in place.

815
00:43:04,400 --> 00:43:06,679
Speaker 1: So what does this all mean for you listening right now?

816
00:43:06,679 --> 00:43:07,400
What's the takeaway?

817
00:43:07,599 --> 00:43:11,960
Speaker 2: Well, the leaks, the declassifications we've discussed today, they provide

818
00:43:11,960 --> 00:43:15,639
this rare, sometimes painful, but necessary look behind the curtain.

819
00:43:15,840 --> 00:43:19,480
Speaker 1: Yeah, a reminder that sometimes the unbelievable parts of history

820
00:43:19,519 --> 00:43:21,800
are unfortunately the most factual.

821
00:43:22,079 --> 00:43:26,639
Speaker 2: Exactly and gaining knowledge quickly but thoroughly, like we try

822
00:43:26,639 --> 00:43:30,000
to do in these deep dives, means understanding these hidden currents,

823
00:43:30,320 --> 00:43:34,440
the failures of oversight, the long term consequences like environmental contamination,

824
00:43:35,079 --> 00:43:38,639
the extreme limits of executive power. It's not just about

825
00:43:38,639 --> 00:43:39,880
the headlines, It's about.

826
00:43:39,719 --> 00:43:43,800
Speaker 1: The deep cuts, understanding the mechanisms behind the official story.

827
00:43:43,679 --> 00:43:47,800
Speaker 2: And these documents, the detailed accounts of sea sprays, fall out,

828
00:43:48,079 --> 00:43:51,559
the revelations and the Pentagon papers, the fightening proposal of

829
00:43:51,599 --> 00:43:57,440
Operation Northwoods. They really force us collectively to continually renegotiate

830
00:43:57,480 --> 00:44:02,519
that delicate balance between legitimate nowtional security and fundamental public trust.

831
00:44:03,000 --> 00:44:07,519
Speaker 1: Knowing that the government once formally proposed weaponizing public outrage,

832
00:44:07,719 --> 00:44:12,079
manufacturing consent for war. That should permanently change how we

833
00:44:12,159 --> 00:44:14,719
evaluate official claims of necessity. Shouldn't that?

834
00:44:14,880 --> 00:44:17,599
Speaker 2: It absolutely should. It demands a higher level of scrutiny,

835
00:44:17,639 --> 00:44:19,119
a more skeptical.

836
00:44:18,599 --> 00:44:21,400
Speaker 1: Eye, because the discovery of these secrets, whether it happens

837
00:44:21,440 --> 00:44:25,079
through whistleblowers like Elsberg risking everything, or just through simple

838
00:44:25,119 --> 00:44:28,920
declassification decades later when no one involves still around, it

839
00:44:29,000 --> 00:44:34,400
reveals this continuous operational capacity for extreme measures within the system.

840
00:44:34,480 --> 00:44:38,679
So if documents detailing formalized plans to create manufactured outrage

841
00:44:39,000 --> 00:44:42,440
to target US ships, if those existed once within the

842
00:44:42,519 --> 00:44:46,360
highest ranks of government, Yeah, what ongoing classified plans, perhaps

843
00:44:46,400 --> 00:44:49,840
equally terrifying in their moral implications, might be sitting in

844
00:44:49,840 --> 00:44:52,679
a file somewhere right now, just waiting for their own

845
00:44:52,679 --> 00:44:54,039
eventual declassification.

846
00:44:54,199 --> 00:44:56,519
Speaker 2: It's a sobering thought, isn't it? What secrets are still

847
00:44:56,519 --> 00:44:57,320
waiting to surface?

848
00:44:57,480 --> 00:45:00,400
Speaker 1: Definitely something to mull over until our next DA dive